


Fewer Spectators

by Slenderlock



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Bucky gets better, Bucky has issues, Bucky remembers, Bucky whump, Happy Ending, M/M, No explicit scenes, Steve is a good friend, implied sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-14
Updated: 2014-04-14
Packaged: 2018-01-19 10:29:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,688
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1466065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Slenderlock/pseuds/Slenderlock
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Four days after rescuing the man from the bottom of the Potomac, the metal of his arm begins to rust. It takes another five until the electric currents that had allowed mobility begin to fail. It takes two more until the arm stops working entirely. </p><p>He doesn't remove it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fewer Spectators

**Author's Note:**

> This story is sort of in the universe of my other fic 'Boundaries', but there are a few continuity errors that make it incompatible. But you can imagine them taking place in the same universe if you want! However, it is the universe in which my fic 'To Invite Madness' takes place. Neither fic has to be read to understand this one.

Four days after rescuing the man from the bottom of the Potomac, the metal of his arm begins to rust. It takes another five until the electric currents that had allowed mobility begin to fail. It takes two more until the arm stops working entirely.

He doesn't remove it.

For one, he wouldn't know how. The machine is embedded into his side, had been routed to his brain. He might risk some sort of damage if he takes it out. But the other reason- the real reason, really- is because he remembers. He remembers jobs, assignments, missions. He remembers fighting with a skill that he'd never possessed. He remembers that man talking to him, saying things that had made him pause. And he also remembers snow and ice and a fall.

He remembers, and that is why the arm stays.

The star begins to fade away after four months pass. He pretends he doesn't make a habit of rubbing his shoulder against his clothes every chance he gets.

It is in Berlin where he first sees the man again. Steve, his mind supplies. Steve, yes. Steve is there. He does not know why or even how Steve is here, because he's been careful, so careful. He's covered every trace, erased every step. There's no possible way that Steve could have found him here. Unless it's a coincidence, his mind supplies. But then again, his mind hasn't been the most helpful in the past few months. Months? He thinks it's months. Maybe a year. He doesn't know.

He sees the man, but the man does not see him.

He hears the man say a name, and he remembers.

"Bucky," the man says, vocie low and barely audible through the rushing crowds of people. "Where are you?"

Words, uncalled, rise to his lips, he barely restrains himself from saying them. _Who the hell is Bucky?_ He remembers that, he remembers saying that. At the bridge. Who the hell is Bucky? That's right, the man had said something, and that something had been a name. Bucky.

Who the hell _is_ Bucky?

The man is easy enough to find- Steve, he learns. Steve Rogers. _Stevie_.

Steve's hotel rooms are usually adequate. They aren't expensive enough to sport Jacuzzis, but they always contain at least a shower and a television. He searches through each of them as he follows, roots through every drawer, searches through Steve's luggage. Steve's clothes follow through a strict color regime, with black the only shade not found in the American flag. In Prague, he finds Steve's dog tags, from the army. They are buried in the far corner, underneath his socks. Christ, even his socks are red, white, and blue. He takes the tags and replaces everything in the case, zips it up, and leaves.

Steve doesn't seem to follow a linear progression. Sometimes he stays for weeks, sometimes only for hours. They end up in America again, and he knows that Steve will be leaving soon, not here to stay. Steve stops in a small coffee shop, picks up his order, and leaves.

"Name?" the woman asks. Oh, yes, he's the next in line. When he doesn't give her an answer, she coughs s little. Doubtless she's heard worse from customers. "Name?" she repeats, after a few seconds.

He could bolt and run. There is nothing covering the door, nothing keeping him from leaving the building and escaping, leaping from roof to roof, not looking back. But he does not want to draw attention to himself, not now.

A name? He has one. He has to have one. He almost says "The Winter Soldier" before he catches himself. That is not him. It hasn't been him for a long time. His arm weighs more than it ever has, now, a barely distinguishable lump of metal. The glove smashed haphazardly over the fingers does not fit anymore, and he has to keep it on with tape to ensure it does not fall away. He lets it hang.

A name. He has nothing. What a luxury it would be to have a name, he thinks bitterly to himself. He remembers having one, once. Before it was taken from him. The man had said it- Steve has said it. What is it?

"Sir-"

"James," he says, and his hand trrembles at his side. "James," he repeats. "Just. James."

The woman nods, seemingly indifferent to his state of anxiety, and scribbles down the name on the cup. "Order?" she asks.

He blinks. The list is mind boggling. Coffee, he thinks, doesn't come with numbers. _James_.

How does he know that? Did he drink coffee before? Yes, he remembers, he did. Coffee- black, it was always just plain black. _Your name is James._

"Nothing in it," he instructs. "Just... black coffee." _James_.

The sharpie swirls around the cup again before the woman nods. "That'll be all?" she asks. _Your name is James Buchanen Barnes._

"Yes."

"Four dollars and thirty seven cents."

Money? Ah, yes, money. He has money, he thinks? Money. _Bucky-_

The people behind him, they are impatient. He can hear them. Their feet are tapping and a few at the back of the line decide to leave. He forces himself away from the counter, shoves his hand against the wood and turns. He no longer cares about attracting attention, he needs to know. James, he remembers. Why is he named James? Why does that name seem to fit, almost fit? It's like a puzzle piece that doesn't fit but is still connected to the same picture. _Bucky_ , he thinks. Why does that fit? Why does Steve know that name?

 _Stevie_.

He makes it to the top of an apartment complex before allowing himself to shout, clutching at his hair. This is the worst place for this to happen- they could find him here, he thinks. He needs to leave. Steve is easy to track, he can pick up the trail whenever he wants to. Now, he needs to leave. He needs to-

They don't check his ID at the train station. He shows them the cover to an empty passport and they nod, not even bothering to look him in the eyes. He wonders if it's his hair that turns people away from his face. Perhaps he should cut it. If he tries, he can tie it back now and it doesn't quite look like a stump. The train ride is long, traveling down the west coast. Seattle passes him by, as does Oregon. The train stops in Los Angeles, not going further south.

He spends the night curled up on a moderately damp motel room bed off the side of the road, scissors still in his hand.

The arm is always covered. Even in the heat of California, he does not wear short sleeves. The heat is bearable. Uncomfortable, but bearable.

He spends a week there, in the motel room, trying to remember. He remembers conversations, a flying car, a name. He remembers coffee and laughter and arguments. He remembers the cold and the shared blanket and the cot. He remembers the war, he remembers a train. He remembers a laboratory and the metal and the screaming. He remembers being given orders, he remembers killing. He remembers bombs and knives and guns, he remembers each and every single person he has killed.

His name, he finally remembers. It is James, he is fairly certain, but nearly all of the memories carry the blunter label, _Bucky_.

When he leaves the motel, the shoulder of his shirt is rubbed raw, fibers breaking, and so he must wear a sweater to cover the damage. But the arm stays on. He remembers.

He finds Steve again nearly two months later. The star is gone from his shoulder, the metal nearly all rusted away. The fingers are gone entirely, leaving a stump halfway down what should be his forearm. Rust crumbles into the glove he attaches. He props it up sideways, keeping the glove taped to the inside of the sweatshirt's front pocket.

He wonders if he should regret immersing it in water to save Steve, but does not wonder for more than a second before he knows the answer.

When Steve returns to his hotel, Bucky follows him. Steve senses someone, but does not change his movements. Bucky easily picks the lock to his room and opens the door to a shield. When nothing happens, the shield lowers. Steve's eyes meet his and then flicker to the rest of him. The bags sinking below his eyes, the hair that has been cropped to a length that is more manageable. The jeans that look like they've been through the mill, the sweater. He takes in Bucky's arm, how it hangs uselessly by his side.

"Bucky," he breathes, and that's enough. Bucky nods, wordlessly. "You remember?" Steve prompts.

"I remember... some," Bucky says. He looks at Steve's shield. "I remember... most things."

"Most things," Steve repeats. Bucky nods again.

"I don't want to, to hurt you," Bucky adds, because it is suddenly important. He remembers protecting Steve, protecting him from everything. "Not- not anymore." His fingers fumble at the neckline of his sweater and he hauls it over his head, revealing the arm.

"Bucky, your-"

"It won't do anything," Bucky assures him. "It won't... punch you, or anything."

Steve nods. He steps to the side. "Fury and Stark would probably punch me in the face for doing this, but come on." Bucky steps into the hotel room, grateful.

"I know you've been following me," Steve says, and Bucky doesn't look at him. "The tags," he says. "I noticed they were gone." The metal feels as if it burns against Bucky's chest. They move to the bed and sit beside each other. "Why now?" Steve asks. "Why did you come to find me?"

"I want to get better," Bucky says. "I'm still not... I'm still different, but I want it to be the same." He looks over at Steve and tries to smile.

"Oh, Bucky." Steve sighs. "No one knows better than I do that things will _never_ be the same."

Bucky's smile falters and he looks at his knees, blinking. "I want to get better," he repeats. "To remember it all. I want to- to be with you."

It's Steve's turn to look at Bucky. "Be with me?" he repeats.

"You know, fight." Bucky shrugs with the one shoulder he still posesses control over. The other remains a deadweight. "On your side."

"Oh," Steve says. "Yes."

"Yes?"

Steve sighs. "I think... I think it will be okay, Bucky."

His name, it sounds so _right_ when Steve says it. It falls off of Steve's tongue like it's nothing he hasn't said a thousand times, and Bucky smiles, for real this time.

"To the end of the line, Buck," Steve murmurs, clasping his hands between his legs. "To the end of the line."

"I remember," Bucky says, "that."

Steve looks at him.

"You remember?"

"Yes."

Steve smiles.

They spend that night together, ignoring the clump of metal and rust that stains the white sheets brown. Bucky remembers so much more, remembers everything about them, remembers how it feels to not know where one body ends and the other begins. Steve coaxes him along, encourages him. When at last they are both spent, they fall asleep to the sound of train whistles in the distance, and Bucky dreams of things that never were for the first time he can remember.

Steve makes Bucky take the sweater off in front of the others, and Bucky knows why. It is evidence of how he has suffered, the cost he has paid. He doesn't see it as such, but it stays as a reminder to him. The arm is everything. A memory of those he has killed and those he has lost.

"If that's what the Russians think technology is," Stark says, folding his arms in a rather unimpressed manner as he looks Bucky's arm up and down, "then I think we're set for the next Cold War."

The red-headed woman in the business suit nudges his side and mutters, "Tony," under her breath.

"Buck," Steve says, "This is... this is the rest of the crew."

Stark, the archer, and Natasha all give Steve a strange look at the word 'crew', but none of them say anything about it.

"Hello," Bucky says, cautiously waving his hand.

"So, lemme guess," Stark continues. The red-headed woman gives a 'tsk' sound and seems to give up on him. "You tracked down your old boyfriend and _rubbed some sense into him?_ "

Bucky doesn't understand, but Steve goes an interesting shade of pink- not red- and holds his ground. "He's not a threat," he assures the group. "He's fragile, still, but... he's not a threat."

"I want," Bucky says, "to join you. Your... group. Family."

'Family' might be a little far fetched, but it is certainly better than 'crew'. None of the others say anything. And then-

"Okay," says Tony, and turns to the kitchen.

"Hang on," the archer presses. "You're just gonna say yes? What about the hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of damage he's done? What about the people he's killed, hm? What, you think he's just gonna waltz back into society and turn into a good guy again?"

A man puts a hand on his shoulders. "Clint," he says, gently. "You know what it's like to do something without your control." From the sound of his voice, so does this man.

"Well, yeah," Clint says, "but that was for a few days, tops. This-" he gestures vaguely in Bucky's direction, "this guy's been in and out of it for years. No way he's just gonna pop back to normal. I don't care what all your science mumbo jumbo says, it's not gonna fix him."

"Then the least you can do is give him a chance. The Stark Tower is one of the most secure places for him right now. JARVIS monitors the whole place. If anything goes wrong, we'll know. And how much damage can he do?" The man smiles again, one of those small, gentle smiles that is so clearly hiding something behind it. "I would know, Clint. This building's made to withstand a lot more than it looks."

Clint sighs. "Fine," he spits. "But put him in a room _not_ directly next to mine. I don't want to wake up without my damn legs."

"Actually," Steve cuts in, and Bucky turns to him- he isn't going to- not here, surely? "He won't need an extra room."

The kitchen erupts with the sound of glass breaking. Six heads turn to the back wall. Tony reappears, holding the remains of a shotglass. "Sorry, Cap," he says, in a tone that means he is not sorry in the slightest, "say that again."

"You already implied-"

"I didn't _mean_ it," Stark insists. His grin is wide and smug, and Bucky likes it for some reason. But that doesn't change the fact that-

"We're just friends," he says, suddenly. The eyes in the room swivel to him again.

"Buck?" Steve asks, after a beat of silence. The trust that had been built up between them since that encounter in the hotel room is crumbling away to nothing, Bucky can feel it.

Natasha looks at both of them for a moment before- impossibly- she smiles.

"Frosty the snowman may have neglected to inform you," she says, breaking the thread of silence that stretches between Steve and Bucky, "but you do know that that's legal now, don't you?"

"Le...gal?" Bucky repeats.

Tony smirks. "Have fun with your boy-toy, Cap. Hell, you can even marry him if you want. JARVIS'll set up your room. It'll play that Captain America song every twenty minutes."

"Tony," says the red-haired woman, reproachfully.

"Oh," Bucky says, feeling slightly off-kilter.

"I could fix that arm up for you, you know," Tony offers, raising an eyebrow. "Replace that hunk of useless metal. Or take it off, whatever you like."

Bucky shakes his head before Tony finishes. "No," he says, hand moving to the rusted arm. "No, it's staying."

"You sure, Buck?" Steve asks. "He could make it however you wanted- with the strength or without. It could be just like it was, or he could make it into-"

"No," Bucky repeats. "I'm keeping it."

Tony looks a little put-off. "If you ever change your mind, just ask for a design. You could design it yourself if you wanted. Just think about it, all right?" Bucky nods.

Natasha looks at Steve. "He'll be all right," she says.

o0O0o

Bucky wants jam.

"So, I was thinking today we'd tour around that new museum."

He really wants his god damned jam.

"You know, the one that just came in? Apparently they've got some stuff from World War two."

If only Thor hadn't been the last one to close the jar.

"We might even run into-"

Bucky throws the jar to the floor, where it shatters. Jam splatters across the tiled floor. It would look like blood if it wasn't blackberry jam, Bucky thinks.

Steve is on his feet and in the kitchen before Bucky has time to blink.

"Bucky?"

"I couldn't open the jar," Bucky says, fist clenching by his side. "I couldn't-"

"Buck, hey, it's all right." Steve picks up the biggest of the broken pieces and throws them away.

"I want- I miss my arm," Bucky admits, quietly.

"Tony can fix it for you," Steve reminds him. "All you'd have to do is ask."

"I can't get rid of this one," Bucky presses.

After the mess is cleaned up, Steve leans on the counter next to him.

"Why?" he asks.

"Because it's my arm."

"No, it's not. It's the Winter Soldier's arm."

"It reminds me. I remember with it."

"You remember what with it?"

"Everything."

Everything, in this case, does not mean the past. It means the present, it means everything the Winter Soldier has ever done.

"Bucky, you need to let it go."

"I can't." Bucky shakes his head. "I killed- Steve, I killed so many people."

"You didn't," Steve says, frowning sternly. "Bucky, that wasn't you."

"They had families-"

"You can't do this to yourself, Buck."

"I have to remember."

"That doesn't mean you have to let those memories rule you." Steve frowns. "Bucky, please." He sighs. "I know you did a lot of things that you aren't proud of, but you never would have done them. Not you. They made you into a weapon in a fight you never wanted to be in, and there was nothing anyone could do."

Bucky shakes his head vigorously. "No, I have to remember-"

"It's not going to help," Steve says, gently. "Remembering like this isn't going to help."

They both stand in the silence of the kitchen. The friege makes a humming sound that Bucky hopes is its electric workings.

He leaves.

Tony, damn him, is waiting. Blank holograms float in Bucky's vision as he pushes the door open.

"Well, well, well, look who it is," Tony greets. "The Winter Slushee." He grins. "Come on. I have some great ideas for this thing already."

When they are done, Bucky has rejected eighty three of Tony's eighty four ideas, only conceding that yes, perhaps a little more strength than a regular human arm would be helpful. And it would certainly make jam jars easier to open.

"Right-o," Tony says, and then scrunches up his nose. "I'm never saying 'right-o' again." He shrugs. "This baby should be ready for you in a few days. You'll be good as new."

Bucky manages to smile.

Clint manages to capture his attention the next night with the offer of a movie 'marathon'. They end up watching Disney movies. ("In chronological order, duh. Watching The Princess and the Frog before The Little Mermaid would be blasphemous")

"You need a cool name," Clint says, flinging a piece of popcorn across the room. It hits Hans of the Southern Isles directly on the nose.

"I have a name."

"Well, we're not calling you 'The Winter Soldier'." Clint shrugs.

"You can call me Bucky," says Bucky. "Because that's my name."

"No, I mean like a cool name. I'm Hawkeye, Tony's Iron Man. You know."

"I don't need a code-name."

"Sure you do, you live here now." This Clint is so different from the one he'd met only a few weeks ago.

"And how am I supposed to come up with one?" Bucky asks.

"For starters, does anything rhyme with your name? Like 'fuck'."

Bucky stares at him, ignoring the movie entirely

"Bucky the Fuckee," Clint says, and shoves his shoulder.

"No."

"Come on. You'd make loads."

"I'm not a _stripper_."

"You'd make a damn good one."

Bucky is suddenly very glad that Steve had decided to claim him on the first day of being here.

The operation is routine. Medicinal tables aren't Bucky's favorite thing to look at, but the fact that Tony decides to color every damn thing in the room either red, white, or blue makes the whole thing seem less clinical. He wakes up when it is done and pushes himself off the bed- with both hands. He brings them both up and flexes his fingers experimentally- it is as if he never lost the arm in the first place. He trails his other hand over the new arm and finds that he can feel, really feel the sensation of skin on skin. Well. Skin on silicone.

"Well?" Stark asks, from the doorway of the room.

Bucky smiles.

"Thank you," he says.

He finds Steve in their room that night, waiting for him. Steve rakes his eyes over the new arm and nods appreciatively.

"Stark did a good job," he notes. "I take it you asked him for what you wanted?" Bucky nods. "Come here, then." They fall asleep together, lost in the sensations of touch.

He still remembers, even without the arm. Sometimes he wakes up ready to finish his mission, even dreams of gunning Steve down in his sleep and waking to find his body, but they stop eventually. He remembers, not everything, but most things.

He remembers.

**Author's Note:**

> Title comes from this quote: "I know I am getting better at golf because I am hitting fewer spectators." -Gerald R. Ford


End file.
